


A Dog and Her Moth

by yhlee (etothey)



Category: Machineries of Empire Series - Yoon Ha Lee
Genre: Dogs, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-06
Updated: 2020-11-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27409915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etothey/pseuds/yhlee
Summary: The Dog's Boy was a Moth.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 35
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	A Dog and Her Moth

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lorata](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lorata/gifts).



The Dog's name was Running Red Over the Sweet Fields Backlit By the Sun, which her mother had given her when she was a newborn pup. (Her mother was something of a romantic.) But the Boy called her, simply, Red. The Dog understood, at a few weeks old, that humans had a difficult time with proper doggy names, and that they were doing the best, just as she was doing her best, even when she tripped over her too-big paws.

The Boy was not, strictly speaking, human. The House came with two humans, who took care of her and the Boy. One of them smelled of the cinnamon cookies they were forever baking, and different pastry flours, and the dog thought of them as Cinnamon, even though they had a human name. It was so difficult to remember human names when the scent association was so strong. The other one smelled like metal and gunpowder, and was always doing funny things with knives and guns, so the dog thought of him as Steel.

The Boy smelled different. Granted, sometimes he walked through a haze of spices, when he had been helping Cinnamon in the kitchen, and sometimes he smelled of metal and sharp oil, when he assisted Steel in maintaining the guns and knives of the House. But beneath those smells was the smell of Moth, which her mother had taught her. It meant the Boy was not like the others, and her mother had said that it was Red's job to protect him from people who did not like Moths. The Dog took this job very seriously. She stayed at the Boy's side whenever she could, following him into the bathroom and curling up next to him on the bed when he slept.

During the breakfast and desserts, the Boy wouldn't let her have any cookies or cinnamon rolls. He said cinnamon wouldn't poison her, but it wasn't meant for her kind, either. Still, he didn't stop her from licking crumbs off his face. It made him laugh, which in turn made the Dog happy. The Boy did not laugh often, and when he did, it was slow and shy, as though he was not used to it. So all the baking was for the purpose of making the Boy laugh, and that made it important.

On the other hand, the Dog was not entirely clear on what the guns and knives were for. Her mother had said, before they parted, that she would understand someday, and that as a proper Red Setter, her heritage included many fine hunting dogs. She would nose about the guns, intending to ask in doggy fashion for an explanation, but both Steel and the Boy shooed her away from the weapons whenever she did that.

But the Boy did not seem interested in hunting, whether that involved guns and knives or not. The Boy liked to comb her pelt, which was the most beautiful one not just in the House, but in the whole wide world. The Dog knew this because he said so every time he stroked her muzzle, or ran his fingers through her silky fur.

Every day, without fail, the Boy took the Dog out for a long ramble through the countryside. He would call her (abbreviated) name in his gentle voice, and she would come running. It was so hard to not to jump up at him in her eagerness, but he had trained her, slowly and patiently, not to do that, and she wanted to be a good Dog for him. Especially since being good meant he gave her the very smelly treats that were her favorite.

They walked together. There had been some talk of a collar and leash, but the Boy refused. "There's no one on this whole planet but us," he had said, "and Red doesn't need them. She'll be happier without." And he called her to him and asked her to sit, and shake paws, and she did those things, and the humans relented. After that she made sure always to do exactly as he said, to prove over and over that she was a good Dog.

And their walks! The Boy let her lope ahead of him through the wind-blown grasses, and over the hills. He threw sticks for her to fetch. It was her favorite game, because she was the best, the fastest, the cleverest Dog. The Boy deserved nothing less.

They explored the woods, which were full of delights like fallen and abandoned beehives, or piles of rotting leaves to plow through, or the deliciously stinky remnants of carcasses. (Any nosing about the stinky carcasses resulted in baths when they returned home, but the Dog considered the hassle worth it.) For his part, the Boy gathered berries, tart-sweet and fragrant. Sometimes he ate them on the spot; sometimes he saved them for the House.

The Dog knew the locations of all the brooks and ponds in the area, so that she never wanted for water. Sometimes the Boy knelt to drink next to her, and sometimes he sipped from a canteen of the coffee that Steel brewed every morning. The Dog liked to try to catch the silver-quick fish that swam in the brooks, but she never quite managed it.

During the golden noons, the Dog and the Boy sat together while he unwrapped the lunch he had brought. The Boy, being thoughtful, brought food for them both, in separate containers. He ate the meat pies with evident relish, even though they smelled intriguingly weird to the Dog. She assumed Moths ate different food than regular humans. But her food was proper doggy food, rich with meat-juices, and kept delightfully warm by the container.

Many things pleased the Boy: the butterflies in colors from orange to startling blue-green, the beautiful drifts of dewy flowers and clumps of grasses, the sweet whispering of the trees. But the Boy always said that what he loved most was spending this time with the Dog. He said it privately to her, out on these walks, and not in front of the humans, and she could smell that he was telling the truth. So the Dog made sure that every walk was the best possible walk that she could make it, and she would lead him to this tree with its ripe fruits, or that ledge with its glorious vista looking toward the distant mountains, just for the Boy's delight.

When they came back to the House, the Boy would stroke her floppy ears and pat her back, and pick the burrs from her fur. He had such kind hands. Sometimes when the other humans were around the Boy, the Dog could smell their wariness, as though they expected violence. She always wondered about that. The Boy was the best, kindest Boy in the world. She couldn't imagine him hurting anyone.

After dinner with Cinnamon and Knife, the Boy combed her fur again, and curled up next to her, and told her stories. He didn't say them out loud. The Dog knew he was too shy for that. But his hands did not lie. His hands said: _You are my best friend_ and _I want every day to be like this one_. And she promised him, with the wagging of her doggy tail, that she would always be his friend, and that she would make every day special for him.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Sholio and Ione for the beta.


End file.
